Curb Magazine Students Receive Regional SPJ Mark of Excellence Awards

An aerial photograph of a highway interchange with the Curb Pause logo superimposed on it
Photo courtesy of curbonline.com

The Society of Professional Journalists Region 6 announced the winners of its Mark of Excellence Awards at their virtual conference on April 10. Each year, SPJ presents these awards honoring the best in student journalism in different categories, including print, radio, television and online.

Curb Magazine received three awards, including Best Student Magazine and Best Affiliated Website. Curb photographer and J-School junior Brian Huynh also received the award for Feature Photography.

In addition to these three awards, a current and former J-Schooler were named finalists for awards. Senior Will Cioci was a finalist for the Non-Fiction Magazine Article award for his article “For what it’s worth”, and Kayla Huynh (BA’20) was a finalist for the Online In-Depth Reporting award for her article “Wisconsin erected barriers to college voters. The pandemic added more.” written for Wisconsin Watch.

“I’m always beyond proud of the work the students do in a semester, but maybe even more so this year,” said Stacy Forster, SJMC Faculty Associate and instructor for J417: Magazine Publishing, which produces Curb. “This group produced a magazine—from scratch! —without ever meeting in person.”

Created during the Fall 2020 semester, Curb Pause was the 19th edition of the student magazine. While making the magazine remotely was a challenge, the group came together to create an award-winning publication.

Regional Mark of Excellence award winners will go on to compete with one another for national awards.